Hunza to launch its first af­ford­able hous­ing project

HONG KONG: Pe­nang-based de­vel­oper Hunza Prop­er­ties Bhd is launch­ing its first af­ford­able hous­ing project this year, tar­get­ing new home buy­ers as po­ten­tial in­vestors are seen to be hold­ing back their pur­chases of higher-end units amid un­cer­tain­ties in the mar­ket.

A sig­nif­i­cant num­ber of Hunza’s clients are over­seas buy­ers.

“From what we have ob­served dur­ing our prop­erty road­shows in Pe­nang, Hong Kong and other places, many peo­ple in­tend to in­vest but are stay­ing on the side­lines due to the cur­rent eco­nomic sit­u­a­tion,” group man­ag­ing di­rec­tor Datuk Khor Siang Gin told StarBiz.

He ex­pected sen­ti­ment in the prop­erty mar­ket to re­main cau­tious over the next few months, be­fore pick­ing up in the sec­ond half of the year.

“I think now is ac­tu­ally a good time to in­vest in the Pe­nang prop­erty mar­ket, as we are con­fi­dent that Pe­nang prop­erty prices are set to soar in two to three years,” Khor said.

While the group’s prod­ucts were mainly mar­keted to lo­cal buy­ers, Hunza’s prop­er­ties also at­tracted for­eign pur­chasers who were look­ing to re­side, re­tire or own a hol­i­day home in Pe­nang.

It, how­ever, would take such op­por­tu­ni­ties into con­sid­er­a­tion.

In­stead of fo­cus­ing on hard-sell­ing its prod­ucts, Hunza would fly in its for­eign pur­chasers to Pe­nang to ex­pe­ri­ence the lo­cal cul­ture, Proud mo­ment: en­vi­ron­ment and cui­sine.

Hunza is ac­tively pro­mot­ing its brand­ing and projects in Hong Kong, Tai­wan, China, Sin­ga­pore and In­done­sia.

De­spite Hunza’s pres­ence abroad, the group has no near-term plans to de­velop prop­erty projects out­side of Malaysia.

Many of Hunza’s Hong Kong pur­chasers or prospec­tive buy­ers are fond of the low-den­sity build­ings, like Alila 2, that fea­tures the com­fort of a mod­ern re­sort life­style, lush green­ery and eco-friendly fea­tures.